The Third Year Chapter 1: Mode 1, an azumanga daioh fanfic

The Third Year

Disclaimer: Any of the characters or themes that appear that AREN'T owned by me are copyright of Kiyohiko Azuma, who created Azumanga Daioh and Yotsubato/Yotsuba&, and thus am making no money out of this. The only thing I own here are some OCs and this fic. No more, no less.

(Morning)

"Wow... did you hear?"

"Hear about what?? Tell me!"

"Hey! Sorry I'm late! What'd I miss?!"

"Where've YOU been man?"

"Had to bike as fast as I can to school--I saw Miss Yukari break her bike chain, and I had to get away before she could steal my bike again--"

"What's going on you guys?"

"Supposedly some weird and stupid rumor just popped into circulation..."

"Hey, no need to act all secretive and all that... spill it already!"

"Hey guys!"

It's the first day of the gang's senior year here at school, and it seems as if the whole gang has been reunited once more in the same homeroom. There was good ol' Chiyo Mihama, pig-tailed child genius extraordinaire. One Yomi Mizuhara was mulling over some things at her desk, wondering what she should get for lunch today. Ayumu Kasuga, known exclusively to her friends and classmates as "Osaka", was simply alternating between looking out the window, and chasing after the colored specks that floated around in her eyes. The giant-girl Sakaki-san was simply perusing through a magazine she brought to class. The athletic Kagura, the one calling out to her friends as she walked into the classroom, headed to her group of friends.

"Ah, good morning Miss Kagura!" The little girl of the group chirped innocently as usual.

"Looks like one more year for us, guys! But WE'LL make it through together!" Kagura stated with her brand of usual confidence, a fist raised in the air.

"Maybe Miss Yukari will be our homeroom teacher again this year." The spacey Osaka pointed out. The loud and unorthodox English teacher was their homeroom teacher during the last two years.

"No doubt about that, then." Sakaki simply said, before breaking away from their conversation to go back to her reading material, absorbed about the perfect feline environment inside a house.

Oddly enough, the sixth member of their clique, the usually loud and supposed 'wildcat' of the group, Tomo Takino, was lost in thought at her desk. "Hmm? Huh? Doubt what?" She didn't pay much effort into joining the conversation.

"Tomo, something on your mind?" The super-athlete walked up to her fellow Bonkura, concerned at her friend's lack of, well, action.

"Nah, it's nothing. I don't wanna talk about it!" Tomo waved her hand off towards Kagura, trying to dismiss the topic at hand. Her head slumped on the desk, looking like she was just about ready to try and pass out intentionally. "And when I say I don't wanna talk about it, I say BACK OFF!" She snapped at Kagura, who was stunned just as she was about to open her mouth.

"Geez! Fine! No need to get all angry with us, Tomo!" Kagura harped back at her.

Just as sudden, the bell rang. Students were piling into their desks, picking favorable spots to converse with deskmates. And, surely enough, the long-haired, bored-looking English teacher, Yukari Tanizaki, walked into the classroom, making her way to the podium at the front of the class, casting her look out to the students in her class.

"Good morning, Class 3-A. I'm gonna be your homeroom teacher, Yukari Tanizaki." She looked at the lazing Takino's desk, almost expecting her to quip a one-liner about the coincidence of being her same homeroom teacher again. "...Oooookay? Anyway,"

And as the teacher went over the immediate basics of the homeroom, Kagura was looking around the room, then turned her head to the child genius. "Hey, Chiyo-chan... don't you think someone's missing from here?" She whispered. "Where's Kaorin?"

"Greetings, class 3-C, my name is Kimura-sensei, and I'll be your homeroom teacher for the year."

Fear... disbelief... sheer, quiet terror... that was all that went through the now-tortured mind of one spastic Kaori Aida, often known to her friends as Kaorin. She was stuck with one of the worst teachers in the school, the teacher with the fascination towards high-school girls. The bane of both the female student population, AND to the female members of the faculty.

HE is who she will see at the beginning of school... EVERY DAY...

She felt a part of herself die inside.

"...And now I'll take Class 1-B's attendance. Let me know you're here when I call your name."

The favorite faculty member of the school, the popular and friendly Physical Education teacher Minamo "Nyamo" Kurosawa, had started taking role call in her homeroom. She saw a lot of fresh new faces in her classroom, calling their names off one by one on the attendance list. Amongst the first years present in this particular classroom, three notable ones particularly stood out, she mused to herself. One was a handsome green-eyed student, taller than his peers (maybe even around Sakaki-sized), with short black hair that touched the bottom of his neck, a faint scar running down his right eye (though not blinding said eye at all) and two more in the faint semblance of a cross on his cheek. Another one had short brown hair, piercing, almost owl-like yellow eyes, and a cocky smile that reminded the teacher of another one of her students in her P.E. class. The third unique-to-Nyamo's-eyes student was a purple-eyed younger-looking boy with short black hair in the back, two flaps of hair on the side of his head, and bangs dyed almost a blood red. She mused that that specific one almost bore an appearance to Osaka.

"...Eiji Kiragashi."

"Present!"

"Naoko Yamano."

"Here!"

"Myoji Sakakuro."

"Here." The scarred student raised his hand, denoting his presence and identity firmly. She nodded to him before continuing.

"Moto Ueda."

"Right here, Sensei!" The 'owl-eyed' boy student raised his hand excitedly. Although she didn't expect that exactly, she nodded to him for that burst of effort.

"And last one on the list... Masanobu Himeaoki." She saw the red-banged male looking at her directly, his neutral demeanor becoming a little more disgusted. This unnerved Nyamo a small bit. "...Um, is something wrong, Himeaoki-kun?"

"..." He was silent for a few seconds. "Just call me Kyoto."

"Oh? How come?" The teacher inquired, letting a normal smile creep up her lips. "Is it because you used to live in Kyoto before you came here?"

"No." He bluntly said, knocking Nyamo's smile off her face with a confused look. "Kyoto's just a cooler name to go by instead of my dumb last name. So..." He raised his hand. "Here."

"Uh... heheheh... good to know."

(Lunchtime)

"Ah... Lunchtime!" Osaka airily cheered to herself, sitting with Chiyo-chan on the top of the school roof, getting ready to eat their lunches. The Osakan simply bought a few units of bread for herself from the cafeteria, while little Chiyo-chan was eating her own special home-made lunches.

"Wow, Chiyo-chan... your lunch, it looks good like it does all the other times!" The little girl's friend was in awe at the sight of the boxed lunch that she was eating. "I wish I can make lunches as good as that..."

"Um... if you want, I don't mind making a lunch for you every now and then, Miss Osaka." The little girl let loose a smile.

Osaka nodded, and turned her attention to the cityscape that can be seen from the top of the roof. "I love the view up here. You can see EVERYTHIN' up here!"

A sweat drop fell from the little genius. "Uh... everything, Miss Osaka?"

The older girl started getting passionate. "Yeah! You can see the city, and the city buildings, and some trees that are inbetween the buildings!" Her face then shifted to melancholy. "Do you think the trees'll be sad if some of the buildings just up and disappeared for some reason?"

"Well... um... it WOULD look weird," Chiyo-chan stated, her head tilted in thought. "But then again, the trees wouldn't be too sad, because people would just build new buildings where the old ones were, or even plant new trees in the old building plots..."

"Ah... so that's what ya think." Osaka stared up into the sky. "...Trees don't like being next to other trees..."

A look of confusion glued itself on Chiyo-chan's face. "Huh? What do you mean by that, Miss Osaka?!"

The child genius and the spacey girl were now just simply talking amongst themselves. Meanwhile, on the opposite end of the roof, the tall first-year student, Myoji Sakakuro, was simply enjoying his own lunch, conversing with who looks to be one of Chiyo and Osaka's classmates, the short-haired and often forgotten-about Chihiro Hayasaka. The girls could hear some bouts of laughter from the other end.

"Hey, isn't that... um... uh..." Osaka was at a loss for words. "What's-her-name over there?"

"Miss Osaka! She does have a name..." the little girl looked over. "But yeah, that is Chihiro-san. I wonder who she's talking to? I've never seen that guy around... do you think he's a first-year?"

"Wha? That's a new guy?" The other one looked bewildered. "I thought that was Sakaki-san tryin' to prove a point over there with her."

"Miss Osaka, that guy over there doesn't look like--" She took another peek at the two conversing teens. "Wow... his face is slightly like hers--but then WHY would she draw lines over her eye and cheek, Miss Osaka??"

"..." Osaka was once more lost in thought... until her eyes opened. "Experimentation!"

"...Uh, let's just finish up our lunch, Miss Osaka..." She chuckled weakly, not really wanting to know what her friend meant by 'experimentation.'

(Afternoon)

One Yukari Tanizaki was merely going over the English course outline, which was actually a pain to deal with in her own opinion, with Class 1-B. She basically covered the topics of what would be taught in her class, what readings there would be, and following all that up with her semi-usual slice of life.

"...And basically it'll help ya in life if you know at least SOME english. The world's getting bigger and more Anglo-phied, and it won't do ya any good if you do stupid things like FALL ASLEEP IN MY CLASS or GOOF AROUND with your studies!" She smirked at her class. "And believe me, if I feel like it, I can make things around here VERY DIFFICULT for you all!" The class's combined eyes all widened. "...And note, I said 'if I feel like it' because that sounds very tedious..."

The stunned faces turned to signs of 'what the--is she serious?' as they looked at Yukari slumping on the podium.

As one student bluntly asked if it would be okay then to just do nothing and don't worry about the classwork, and earning Yukari's contempt once more, one particular student in the back corner was simply stunned through and through; notably, at the entirety of Miss Yukari herself. Who knows what he sees, or from what perspective this student is seeing her as she finally calms down and starts scritching her chalk on the board, but this student, Masanobu 'Kyoto' Himeaoki, could only smile to himself as he watched the English teacher rant on.

Yukari stomped into classroom 3-A after, spotting Tomo waving at her. "Okay, class, do I really have to introduce myself again?? You already saw me this morning at homeroom!"

"Hey Yukari! Sounds like you need to relax! If ya really want, ya don't need to teach us anything today and just let us go for the rest of the day!" Tomo pointed out, really banking on this.

"Nice TRY there, Tomo." Yukari shook her head disapprovingly. "But if I have to suffer through this, the rest of you have to as well." Sighs and groans of defeat wafted all over the room. "Whatever! Now YOU'RE gonna be the one who'll come up here and hand out the course outlines, because you think you can get away with being CUTE on me, Miss Takino."

As Tomo made her way to the front of the classroom and started passing the handouts to her classmates, she passed by Yomi's desk. "You KNOW better than to mess with Miss Yukari when she's... oh, what's the right word... being forced to actually TEACH."

"Oh Yukari's just a little drained out because school started again." Tomo waved the matter off, before resuming passing out handouts. "Once she gets back in her groove, things'll be cool."

"Yeah, that's what YOU think!" Kagura said, taking one from Tomo's hands.

"HEY! I'M THE HANDOUT HANDER! Don't take my JOB away from me!" The Takino girl flipped out.

"Yeah! You're taking the food right out of her mouth!" Osaka added.

"Not really." Sakaki said.

"Um, can I get one too?" Chiyo-chan asked, trying to reach for a handout in Tomo's grasp.

"I SAID LET ME!!!" The loud girl overreacted, pulling the papers out of Chiyo-chan's reach, and retaliating with thwacking her on the head with the remaining handouts. "There! Now will you be a good little runt and let me hand you one--"

"DAMN IT, TOMO!!" Yukari roared. "JUST HAND THE OUTLINES OUT ALREADY!"

(After School)

"Whew..." Kagura sighed. "I never thought school would END, today."

Yomi nodded, looking out the window. "No kidding. The first day of the school year always seems to be the precursor to boring."

"True that!" Tomo got up from her desk, swinging her bookcase around in a circle. "Well, I'll catch you all later!"

"Huh?" Yomi looked at her. "You're the first to go?"

"That's right!" She laughed triumphantly. "I'm the first to go, first to arrive, first to eat, first to finish eating, AND I'll soon be the first to get a higher grade than Chiyo-chan!"

"But Tomo, you only beat me ONCE when it came to tests." Chiyo-chan butted in. "Aside from that," the little girl seemed fired up all of a sudden. "You'll NEVER beat me again! Hehehehe..."

"HA! We'll see about THAT, you little runt!" Tomo countered, ruffling her hair a little. "Anywho, see ya later!" Tomo ran out the room, leaving her friends with the sound of running into a wall followed by an annoyed cry of pain.

"That's odd for Tomo..." The glasses-wearing girl sighed, planting her palm to forehead. "And that's saying something, because she's ALWAYS odd like that."

"Eh, don't worry about her!" Kagura reassured her, grabbing her books and sliding it in her bookcase too. "At least we all know what's gonna come up tomorrow: more school and homework too..."

"Yeah... that's right." Sakaki nodded, standing up with her things all together in her bookcase. "Today will be the day." She said to herself, leaving the other four of her friends behind.

The other girls said their goodbyes to each other, then left. The sky was now painted a yellowish-orange hue, as students were now leaving the classrooms, heading on home. Some stuck around longer to see about openings for club activities, others just hung out with their friends, and some went about doing their own less-than-normal activities.

"C'mon... pick up pick up pick up..."

"Hiii! Sorry that you called me JUST when I was gonna be away from my phone! Your timing kinda sucks... anywho, leave a message and I'll get back to ya!"

"..." Moto Ueda sighed in defeat, and hung up on his cell. "Her away message again... C'mon, where are you?--"

"Hey!" The younger male jolted up a little at the sound of the approaching Tomo. "Whatcha doin', underclassman?"

"Oh it's just you. Well, if you gotta know, senpai, I was just trying to call my girlfriend on her cellphone. She told me she got accepted to this school and that I'd see her today. But she didn't come all day, and she NEVER ignores her cellphone--"

"Yeah yeah, whatever." She walked past him. "C'mon, move it! We can't be late! We still got some things to do."

"Ah! Yeah..." He pocketed his cellphone and caught up to her, walking beside her. "So we shouldn't keep him waiting then... Sis."

"Ugh... I know we shouldn't..." Tomo sighed, an annoyed tone carried in the process as she looked at him. "And don't call me that! We only met two weeks ago, and you've been staying with us for a whole week now, and I don't care what some official medical documents and crap say about you being my half-brother, or what Mom and Dad say, you're NOT my family..."

"Oh... ...I see..."

She sighed, feeling all awkward. "Look, you're an okay guy... a little bit of a nerd, maybe, but I might be able to get used to you with some more time. Just don't go all 'lovey-wovey little brother' on me and I might get used to ya! Okay?"

"Yeah, no worries there." He cheered up a little, as the two made their way to the city.

Laying peacefully on the top of a brick fence, a small, simple grey cat was napping away the rest of the day... until the sound of footsteps woke it up. It tilted its head up to see what woke it from it's delightful cat-nap. It stared blankly as giant-girl Sakaki-san approached the animal. It's simple kitty brain would not understand why this human girl was so fixated with wanting to pat it. However, it knew that it would be fun to repeatedly elude all attempts of giving this human the satisfaction of petting it.

"Okay..." Sakaki said quietly and calmly. "I... I just want to be your friend..." She stepped closer to the still cat. "I won't hurt you... I just... want to..." And from here her arm reaches forward, fingers reaching out, going for the head of the little feline.

That is, until the animal bore its sharp fangs.

"Really? You live around here, Sakakuro-kun?" Chihiro asked the taller first-year, walking beside each other. "So you don't live that far from me then."

"Oh? Then where do you live, Chihiro-senpai?"

"Well, it's not far, actually. You would just have to take a train from here to the next stop on the Eastern Line, and it's just a few blocks away from there that goes to the apartment buildings."

"Really now? I didn't know that--"

Their conversation was cut short as they heard, as well as see from a distance, Sakaki panicking and flailing her arms around as the grey Biting Cat had its teeth sunk deeply into the tall girl's hand. She was running around with the animal still in possession of her hand, and thus distracting her from seeing the lamppost in her path, colliding head-on with it. Only there did the cat finally let go of her hand, running away due to the shock of getting banged into a wall.

"...Uh... is she gonna be okay?" Sakakuro asked his senior.

"Oh don't worry, she's fine. Sakaki-san's tough." She dismissed it light-heartedly. "Though... I wonder why Sakaki-san had that cat on her hand..."

The two walked away, leaving the girl to get up by herself, gingerly lick her wounded hand, then deciding to head on home to power through more bandages due to the bite marks.

(Evening)

In her room, Chiyo-chan was dressed in her pyjamas, getting ready to go to bed.

"We had a good day at school today, Mr. Tadakichi." She said to her great pyrenees, who had barked in response. "Yep! It's so great to be in the same class with all of my friends again." The little girl sighed. "Although, I wish Tomo wouldn't be so... Tomo. But then again that's what makes her, her. I wonder what tomorrow will bring..."

Mr. Tadakichi barked once again in agreement. She yawned a little kid yawn, petting the very soft top of the loyal animal's head, then climbed into bed.

"...There's always tomorrow."

Sakaki muttered to herself, looking down at her bandaged fingers, mulling over her latest defeat at the fangs of the Biting Cat. She sat at her desk, pushing her textbook aside so she had more room to look at her animal magazine.

"Yeah... there's always tomorrow."

"AW NO WAY!! I SO jumped over that pit!"

'Game Over' were the only words that Kagura saw on her TV as she was playing on her game console. She was sure that she had timed her manuever correctly. She didn't take into account the fact that the one area was slightly bugged.

"MAN! Are you KIDDING ME?!"

Already resting in bed, Osaka was breathing comfortably. Her lips turned into an astounded smile, motioning an amazed gasp, no doubt dreaming of something surreal and wacky, like multiple Chiyo-chans picking her up in the air, flying over a minty sea of lettuce and dolphins.

"Wow..." She said airily in her sleep. "Greeeeeen..."

"--lled me JUST when I was gonna be away from my phone! Your timing kinda sucks... anywho, leave a message and I'll get back to ya!"

"Oh will you GIVE THAT GIRL a REST already??!" Tomo got quite annoyed at her half-brother's attempts to contact his girlfriend. "GOD! If she doesn't want to talk to ya now, just leave her be and call her tomorrow!"

"...I guess you're right." Dejectedly, he hung up his phone and powered it off, setting it on his nightstand. He only took this spare room as his own a week ago, so it wasn't anything to write home about.

"Of COURSE I'm right! Hahaha--YOU can just call it Big Sister's Intuition!" She boasted and laughed out loud, netting a sweat drop from behind Moto's head.

"Tomo-chan! Moto-kun!" The voice of the father Takino called from their living room. "It's starting in a couple of minutes."

"Sweet!" She looked into his eyes, flashing a Takino-brand smile. "Well, nothing says being a part of the family more than watching a movie together, halfling! What do ya say?"

"Halfling?! ...Yeah, sounds fun!"

And so it would be a good evening in the Takino household.

(Darkest Night)

"...Wh-wh-where am I...?? How'd I get here?"

Sounds of footsteps echoing along pavement and puddles, the sound of rain pelting the ground.

"Mom?? Dad?? MOM!! DAD!! WHERE ARE YOU?!"

Another pair of echoes following behind. Footsteps running at a frantic pace now. The sounds of hands, clinging desperately to iron gates, and of metal rattling.

"WHERE AM I?! PLEASE! HELP!! SOMEONE!! ANYONE!!!"

Faint steps trailing behind the fearful girl. Gasps of terror.

"Wh-who... WHO ARE YOU?!?!"

"Shhh... it will ALL be over soon."

"WAIT... WHAT ARE YOU--SOMEONE PLEASE--"

Blood-curdling screams fading soundlessly into the dim night. Eerie noises, as if carrying away the misery...

A/N: It won't get there yet, but the rating will rise up when it starts getting to the more M-qualified material found in the later chapters. Please DO stay tuned.

Also, names go "first name, last name" so as not to add any confusion.